Why is BU considered low yield?

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Okay, this is a semi-rhetorical question. It's obviously low yield because everyone and their dog wants to live in Boston, and most people don't have a realistic shot at Harvard, so BU (and Tufts) get close to 12,000 applications each. Attractive urban location+relatively low admitted stats=low yield school.

But BU's stats aren't actually low at all. The mean accepted student's cGPA (per MSAR) is 3.81, the sGPA is 3.80, and the MCAT is 517. That's just a hair less selective than Einstein, identical to Case, and more selective than USC-Keck, Rochester, Emory(!), Miami, and Hofstra.

Then there's this interesting snippet from their website that was posted on /r/premed a while ago: . Before even considering who to interview, the admissions office works to "establish a universe of academically qualified individuals ... based largely, but not exclusively, upon quantitative data" from the initial pool of about 12,000 applications. About 7,500 people are included in this "universe." IOW, more than a third of the people who applied to BU were doomed out of the gate by (chiefly) their numbers.

Tl;Dr: BU isn't a conventional "low yield" school. Its applicant pool is swelled by being in such a desirable location, but if you don't have the numbers or an extremely compelling story, your time would be better spent applying elsewhere. Conversely, if you do have the numbers and like what you see, there's no reason not to apply.

Incidentally, why aren't Emory and Miami low-yield? They're in very attractive locations, and their stats aren't as prohibitive as BU's, but they only get like 8K applications each.

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[efle]

It comes down to how you define "low yield."

If low yield means high applicant volume, BU definitely fits that. It is always in the handful of schools with the highest volume of apps (#6 last year to be exact).

If low yield means even people with competitive numbers very often get skipped, it still fits. Even if only 25-33% of applicants have strong stats, that's 3000-4000 people interested in less than 200 seats. If you are someone with a 3.8/517, they are going to be relatively much lower yield than, say, Case Western where the median stats are identical but the applicant volume is halved.

It's only high up there in terms of total number though. If you instead look at "low yield" in terms of applicants per seat, BU has nowhere near the biggest ratio. So if low yield means most competitors per seat, it's a very different set of schools.

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[Microbug]

Your premise is incorrect, not everyone wants to live in Boston.

 

[Med Ed]

Okay, this is a semi-rhetorical question. It's obviously low yield because everyone and their dog wants to live in Boston,

Many people would rather remove their own gonads with rusty farming implements than live in Boston.

Be that as it may, back in the day the reason why everyone and their dog wanted to apply to BU was that it had no secondary application, just the fee. It was literally the easiest school to apply to.

Not sure if that's still the case.

 

[Goro]

Okay, this is a semi-rhetorical question. It's obviously low yield because everyone and their dog wants to live in Boston, and most people don't have a realistic shot at Harvard, so BU (and Tufts) get close to 12,000 applications each. Attractive urban location+relatively low admitted stats=low yield school.

But BU's stats aren't actually low at all. The mean accepted student's cGPA (per MSAR) is 3.81, the sGPA is 3.80, and the MCAT is 517. That's just a hair less selective than Einstein, identical to Case, and more selective than USC-Keck, Rochester, Emory(!), Miami, and Hofstra.

Then there's this interesting snippet from their website that was posted on /r/premed a while ago: . Before even considering who to interview, the admissions office works to "establish a universe of academically qualified individuals ... based largely, but not exclusively, upon quantitative data" from the initial pool of about 12,000 applications. About 7,500 people are included in this "universe." IOW, more than a third of the people who applied to BU were doomed out of the gate by (chiefly) their numbers.

Tl;Dr: BU isn't a conventional "low yield" school. Its applicant pool is swelled by being in such a desirable location, but if you don't have the numbers or an extremely compelling story, your time would be better spent applying elsewhere. Conversely, if you do have the numbers and like what you see, there's no reason not to apply.

Incidentally, why aren't Emory and Miami low-yield? They're in very attractive locations, and their stats aren't as prohibitive as BU's, but they only get like 8K applications each.

Wow! I didn't see that their mCAT median jumped so high! But interestingly, they interview about 10% of their applicant pool (about 1000 out of 11000), which is about the same as Harvard, but more than Tufts.

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Your premise is incorrect, not everyone wants to live in Boston.

Hyperbole. But there's a rural physician shortage for a reason.

Wow! I didn't see that their mCAT median jumped so high! But interestingly, they interview about 10% of their applicant pool (about 1000 out of 11000), which is about the same as Harvard, but more than Tufts.

They have a substantial post-interview cut though. About two thirds. US News is wrongety-wrong-wrong with their 60% post-interview acceptance figure.

 

[efle]

Hyperbole. But there's a rural physician shortage for a reason.


They have a substantial post-interview cut though. About two thirds. US News is wrongety-wrong-wrong with their 60% post-interview acceptance figure.

Why's that wrong? Interview 1000, admit 600, matriculate 200 would be a very typical breakdown

 

[BombsAway]

I don't understand the appeal of Boston. If i'm gonna be cold, i want mountains.

 

[Goro]

Hyperbole. But there's a rural physician shortage for a reason.


They have a substantial post-interview cut though. About two thirds. US News is wrongety-wrong-wrong with their 60% post-interview acceptance figure.

US News wrong???!!! Imagine that!

 

[paran0idandr0id42]

Incidentally, why aren't Emory and Miami low-yield? They're in very attractive locations, and their stats aren't as prohibitive as BU's, but they only get like 8K applications each.

IIRC Emory said on my interview day they received over 10K applicants this year, so they may soon be considered part of the “low-yield”

Also, they have a fairly strong IS bias, which could potentially explain the lower stats, or stats may just not factor in as much for their admissions, who knows—for example Pitt has the same accepted student median MCAT.


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[seren1051]

What kind of people and their dogs have you been chatting with? The name of Boston is evil and cold even with Canadians like myself. But I wonder if the number is inflated by Californians who mistakenly equates Boston with LA/SF and Massachusetts as the east coast Cali. I think more than half of all students I met during my interview day were from Cali.

It's only high up there in terms of total number though. If you instead look at "low yield" in terms of applicants per seat, BU has nowhere near the biggest ratio. So if low yield means most competitors per seat, it's a very different set of schools.

Doesn't Boston accept ~50 people of their 190 seats from their linkage program? I'm not sure if they have to submit AMCAS like others - if not, then their ratio would jump from ~55 to ~78, putting them right next to Georgetown.

 

[efle]

Doesn't Boston accepts ~50 people of their 190 seats from their linkage program?

I don't think any BS/MD programs are that big? I thought most were like a dozen people per year?

 

[efle]

Found it:

Class Profile | School of Medicine

Looks like ~20 BS/MD each year. No idea whether they submit an AMCAS or get reported among the admits to US News.

 

[seren1051]

Found it:

Class Profile | School of Medicine

Looks like ~20 BS/MD each year. No idea whether they submit an AMCAS or get reported among the admits to US News.

mmhmm okay. I scribbled '170 class, 40 BSMD, so ~120 seats' on my interview sheet...but it was super early in the morning and I was only half conscious when writing this down.

Edit: I guess its ~40 when you consider all their pathways together (BSMD, EMSSP, MMEDIC)

 

[ChymeofPassion]

No one in Boston wants to live in Boston.

- Bitter Masshole living in Boston

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

US News wrong???!!! Imagine that!

I didn't know their high MCAT was a recent change, btw. In that case, I wonder if they're going to see their applicant pool shrink a bit as its reputation gets more competitive.

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Your premise is incorrect, not everyone wants to live in Boston.

Well, everyone who can tolerate 1) the cold, and 2) not being in NYC, right?

 

[Microbug]

Well, everyone who can tolerate 1) the cold, and 2) not being in NYC, right?

You know there are other cities in the northeast besides Boston and NYC right? (This is coming from a New Yorker)

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

It comes down to how you define "low yield."

If low yield means high applicant volume, BU definitely fits that. It is always in the handful of schools with the highest volume of apps (#6 last year to be exact).

But doesn't that go for every school to some extent?

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

You know there are other cities in the northeast besides Boston and NYC right? (This is coming from a New Yorker)

Hey, I'm a Philadelphian, and I'll happily make the case that Philadelphia is a world-class city to rival anywhere in the US except for New York. But Philly doesn't have the pull that Boston does, even if I think it should.

 

[Microbug]

Hey, I'm a Philadelphian, and I'll make the case that Philadelphia is a world-class city to rival anywhere in the US except for New York. But Philly doesn't have the pull that Boston does, even if I think it should.

Your insistence over how everyone and their dog wants to live in Boston is weirding me out. As a native New Yorker, I think the Midwest is way better than NYC, actually I take that back, pretty much anywhere else in the country is better than NYC.

Why would you pay 3k for a tiny apt when you can have a mansion with yards...?

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Your insistence over how everyone and their dog wants to live in Boston is weirding me out. As a native New Yorker, I think the Midwest is way better than NYC, actually I take that back, pretty much anywhere else in the country is better than NYC.

Hey, I only said the word "dog" once ITT. And we're all entitled to our personal preferences--personally I'm in the Midwest right now and can't wait to get back east--but there are preferences and then there's data, and the data show that Boston's population (and its housing market) has boomed in the last few years.

 

[Microbug]

Hey, I only said the word "dog" once ITT. And we're all entitled to our personal preferences--personally I'm in the Midwest right now and can't wait to get back east--but there are preferences and then there's data, and the data show that Boston's population (and its housing market) has boomed in the last few years.

So has human population and the house market almost everywhere else... you need some proper normalization and controls for your claim

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

So has human population and the house market almost everywhere else...

There's a rural physician shortage for a reason.

Also, Rust Belt.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

I don't understand the appeal of Boston. If i'm gonna be cold, i want mountains.

In Boston, you get the cold and snooty Harvard students. How can you beat that?

 

[BombsAway]

In Boston, you get the cold and snooty Harvard students. How can you beat that?

Every harvard grad I know irl has a weird sort of prestige guilt where they go out of their way to not drop the "H bomb".

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Every harvard grad I know irl has a weird sort of prestige guilt where they go out of their way to not drop the "H bomb".

And yet specifically avoiding saying where you went to school out of consideration for the peasants' feelings is orders of magnitude more snobby than just saying "I went to Harvard."

 

[Microbug]

Every harvard grad I know irl has a weird sort of prestige guilt where they go out of their way to not drop the "H bomb".

Every Harvard grad I know goes out of their way to make sure you know they went to harvard

 

[DrDwayneJohnson]

Every Harvard grad I know goes out of their way to make sure you know they went to harvard

I imagine Harvard grads to be a lot like Crossfit people in this regard.

First rule of Crossfit: Don't stop talking about Crossfit

 

[ChymeofPassion]

I imagine Harvard grads to be a lot like Crossfit people in this regard.

First rule of Crossfit: Don't stop talking about Crossfit

I've met both kinds. Some that say they go to school "across the river" (alluding to Charles River, MIT/Harvard).

Then I had a dermatologist that, when he asked what school I went to (a lower tier school than Harvard/MIT in the Boston area), he started talking about how he went to MIT, talked about how great it was, and started quizzing me on MIT trivia. I pretended to have no idea what it was and said "oh is that like Harvard's engineering school".

Both kinds of people.

 

[efle]

But doesn't that go for every school to some extent?

Nah, take the example I gave of Case Western. Similar stats, similar number interviewed, half as many applicants. Fully doubles your odds!

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Nah, take the example I gave of Case Western. Similar stats, similar number interviewed, half as many applicants. Fully doubles your odds!

True! But again, if BU receives 4000+ Hail Mary applications, that significantly improves your odds if you have good stats and fit their mission.

I guess what makes them seem different from the other "low yield" schools is that GW/Georgetown/Tulane/etc. get so many applications that they could probably stock their classes with high stat applicants and boost their selectivity (on paper, at least), but they don't choose to do this. It seems like BU does, to an extent.

 

[Goro]

Every Harvard grad I know goes out of their way to make sure you know they went to harvard

Two of the most brilliant doctors I know are HMS grads!

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Two of the most brilliant doctors I know are HMS grads!

Unpopular opinion: a lot of the time, things and institutions with excellent reputations have excellent reputations because they're good at what they do.

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

Why's that wrong? Interview 1000, admit 600, matriculate 200 would be a very typical breakdown

It would be reasonable, but Dr. Witzberg explicitly told my interview crew that the actual figure was more like 30%. The air went out of the room when he said this. I have no idea where US News got their figure.

 

[efle]

It would be reasonable, but Dr. Witzberg explicitly told my interview crew that the actual figure was more like 30%. The air went out of the room when he said this. I have no idea where US News got their figure.

I don't buy for a second that BU has a 63% yield though. For comparison Stanford and Columbia are just below 50%

P.S. US news gets those values from the school admissions offices.

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

I don't buy for a second that BU has a 63% yield though. For comparison Stanford and Columbia are just below 50%

P.S. US news gets those values from the school admissions offices.

Well, there are probably ways to cook the books. Could a school accept up to capacity, waitlist the rest, and then admit as needed once people start taking other offers?

It's also very likely that someone amazing enough to get into Columbia would get equally appealing offers and/or be practically bribed by their state schools to attend. I mean, US News is claiming that Northwestern has about 33% yield, which is surprisingly low in my view.

Also, US News can make mistakes on its end. They're currently claiming a hundred percent post-II acceptance rate at SLU. There is no chance that that's accurate.

 

[efle]

Well, there are probably ways to cook the books. Could a school accept up to capacity, waitlist the rest, and then admit as needed once people start taking other offers?

It's also very likely that someone amazing enough to get into Columbia would get equally appealing offers and/or be practically bribed by their state schools to attend. I mean, US News is claiming that Northwestern has about 33% yield, which is surprisingly low in my view.

Also, US News can make mistakes on its end. They're currently claiming a hundred percent post-II acceptance rate at SLU. There is no chance that that's accurate.

I bet it's the waitlist and he was describing straight admits, yeah. Something like 35% direct admitted, 20% waitlisted that later get an offer, the remaining half either straight reject or WL -> reject. That would add up pretty well.

Northwestern does have very low yield, same with Vandy. Most of the population is from the west or northeast so the locations aren't that popular, and on top of that they are usually interviewing and admitting a lot of people who get into the very big names. That's why they throw lots of merit money around. Don't know if it's still the case, but around when I applied Vandy was offering scholarships for ~75% of tuition to the majority of admits and still getting less than 1/3 admits to matriculate.

SLU probably made the error and reported the same value in both fields. I'm pretty certain for these figures US news just asks the schools for those numbers along with dozens of other values and that's what goes into the Compass template for the school. They're not trying to calculate it themselves or anything like that

 

[enchantediris]

I bet it's the waitlist and he was describing straight admits, yeah. Something like 35% direct admitted, 20% waitlisted that later get an offer, the remaining half either straight reject or WL -> reject. That would add up pretty well.

Northwestern does have very low yield, same with Vandy. Most of the population is from the west or northeast so the locations aren't that popular, and on top of that they are usually interviewing and admitting a lot of people who get into the very big names. That's why they throw lots of merit money around. Don't know if it's still the case, but around when I applied Vandy was offering scholarships for ~75% of tuition to the majority of admits and still getting less than 1/3 admits to matriculate.

SLU probably made the error and reported the same value in both fields. I'm pretty certain for these figures US news just asks the schools for those numbers along with dozens of other values and that's what goes into the Compass template for the school. They're not trying to calculate it themselves or anything like that

At my interview at Vanderbilt, one of the presenters specifically said that the 75% scholarship to 75% of the class was not true. I tried to keep a straight face when she said she didn't know where that number came from

 

[efle]

At my interview at Vanderbilt, one of the presenters specifically said that the 75% scholarship to 75% of the class was not true. I tried to keep a straight face when she said she didn't know where that number came from

Huh, wonder if that's new. I heard directly from a friend that interviewed there the cycle before me that they were told the majority 75% thing was true in their financial aid presentation. Seems verified by some online random blog in 2015 here too that it used to be very common (about half get 75% was what they were told).

 

[enchantediris]

Huh, wonder if that's new. I heard directly from a friend that interviewed there the cycle before me that they were told the majority 75% thing was true in their financial aid presentation. Seems verified by some online random blog in 2015 here too that it used to be very common (about half get 75% was what they were told).

That might be the case! The number she actually quoted was closer to 10-15% of the class that would recieve scholarships.

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

I bet it's the waitlist and he was describing straight admits, yeah. Something like 35% direct admitted, 20% waitlisted that later get an offer, the remaining half either straight reject or WL -> reject. That would add up pretty well.

Northwestern does have very low yield, same with Vandy. Most of the population is from the west or northeast so the locations aren't that popular, and on top of that they are usually interviewing and admitting a lot of people who get into the very big names. That's why they throw lots of merit money around. Don't know if it's still the case, but around when I applied Vandy was offering scholarships for ~75% of tuition to the majority of admits and still getting less than 1/3 admits to matriculate.

SLU probably made the error and reported the same value in both fields. I'm pretty certain for these figures US news just asks the schools for those numbers along with dozens of other values and that's what goes into the Compass template for the school. They're not trying to calculate it themselves or anything like that

Surprised to hear that about Northwestern, it being in Chicago.

Also, I know that at Brown the apparently high post-II acceptance rate is distorted by the BS/MD people, who don't always choose to attend.

 

[ChymeofPassion]

Surprised to hear that about Northwestern, it being in ChIraq.

Also, I know that at Brown the apparently high post-II acceptance rate is distorted by the BS/MD people, who don't always choose to attend.

FTFY

 

[Anonimus.Maximus]

FTFY

And Penn is in Philadelphia, the most violent East Coast city whose name doesn't start with "B" and end with "altimore." Doesn't seem to hurt Perelman a bit.

Hell, I can think of some schools I applied to because I'm interested in Emergency and I know I'll see crazy stuff on their EM rotations.

 

[efle]

That might be the case! The number she actually quoted was closer to 10-15% of the class that would recieve scholarships.

Wow, yeah if it's really only 10% now then they've changed policy in a big way. Maybe it wasn't helping yield enough to be worth it like they'd hoped.

Surprised to hear that about Northwestern, it being in Chicago.

Also, I know that at Brown the apparently high post-II acceptance rate is distorted by the BS/MD people, who don't always choose to attend.

Chicago is no doubt the most popular place to be in the Midwest. But if you're from new England and you also got into Cornell, or maybe you're from southern CA and have UCSD as an option? I'm sure they steal the person away like 5x as often as the reverse

 

[efle]

Surprised to hear that about Northwestern, it being in Chicago.

Also, I know that at Brown the apparently high post-II acceptance rate is distorted by the BS/MD people, who don't always choose to attend.

Some schools do legit have stupidly high post-interview admit rates though. Both Northwestern and U Michigan admit something like 70-75% post interview iirc.

RE Penn: Don't forget they also offer like 2 dozen full rides per year, while Stanford/Harvard/Hopkins have need-only policies!

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

And Penn is in Philadelphia, the most violent East Coast city whose name doesn't start with "B" and end with "altimore." Doesn't seem to hurt Perelman a bit.

Hell, I can think of some schools I applied to because I'm interested in Emergency and I know I'll see crazy stuff on their EM rotations.

Clearly, you've never been across the river to Camden. It's almost always in the top 3 or 4 most dangerous cities in America (well above B-more and any other east coast city).

 

[efle]

Clearly, you've never been across the river to Camden. It's almost always in the top 3 or 4 most dangerous cities in America (well above B-more and any other east coast city).

B more is #1 in the nation tho?

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

B more is #1 in the nation tho?

No. It's not even in the top 10 based on number of violent crimes per 1,000 residents.

 

[efle]

No. It's not even in the top 10 based on number of violent crimes per 1,000 residents.

According to good old wiki it's #5 per capita if you count everything violent from robbery to murder/manslaughter, and #2 by murder/manslaughter alone. Beat out only by St Louis lol